Band feels certain new work will be hit

The band is going through a period of transition.
By JOHN BENSON
VINDICATOR CORRESPONDENT
The clock is ticking for The Exies, and nobody hears it louder than singer Scott Stevens.
For the past few years, the Los Angeles rock band has seemingly been relegated to the on-deck circle. After two major-label albums -- 2003's "Inertia" and 2004's "Head for the Door" -- and numerous high-profile opening slots, including tours with Velvet Revolver and Motley Crue, the group was dropped by Virgin Records, suffered a line-up change and faced an uncertain future.
Today the band has added new members, found an independent label and is about to release its latest effort, "A Modern Way of Living with the Truth." Still, Stevens admits there's a sense of make-it-or-break-it time with the band he helped form exactly a decade ago.
"Absolutely, there's a little bit of an urgency, but I wouldn't say it's desperation anymore," said Stevens, calling from Los Angeles. "I don't know, it's weird. We feel really, really confident about this album, so I don't see why it's not going to work. I'm not being egotistical in any way or anything like that; I think it's a solid piece of work, and it needs to get exposure and be given a chance. It's got a lot of truth and human emotions that we can all identify with, and it's not reinventing the wheel."
Reinterpreting Talking Heads
What may come across as typical artist aggrandizing actually has some merit. While Stevens may feel the band isn't reinventing the wheel on "A Modern Way of Living with the Truth," which is due out May 8, the truth is the group is reinterpreting an '80s classic -- the Talking Heads' "Once in a Lifetime" -- in a fashion that invariably transcends not only the original but anything else found on rock radio today.
Stevens' version is completely reworked leaving only the chorus -- and just barely -- as a touchstone to the original.
"I found such a destructive beauty in the lyrics and the song," Stevens said. "And I thought this is so existential in its meaning and what he's talking about, and how appropriate that we're The Exies, which is short for the existentialists. I kept on reading the lyrics, and it just became this thing of beauty to me. I just started messing around on my acoustic guitar about the way those lyrics made me feel on that day, and it just kind of came out that way."
He added, "I put a little thought into it. I wanted to change the tuning of it, the chord structures, but keep the melody intact so when it got there, the people might recognize it. But I wanted to totally do something different on the verses. It just kind of happened. I enjoy it. It has a nice feeling to it."
Touring
While The Exies await the release of "A Modern Way of Living with the Truth" -- with rock radio already playing the new album's lead single, "Difference in You," which Stevens describes as a follow-up to the group's 2004 hit single "Ugly" -- the band is hoping to create excitement for the project in the grass-roots fashion of touring as much as possible. Having just opened for Buckcherry and Three Days Grace, the quartet is back on the road supporting Smile Empty Soul. The Exies makes its Youngstown debut Tuesday at The Wedge.
"We're definitely one of the loudest rock bands around," Stevens said, laughing. "We keep getting noise violations or complaints wherever we play."